Monday, June 30, 2008

Being bombarded by environmental news daily, at first I thought Aliance-Enviro is just another blog about "going green." Well, once I click on their website, I found out that it is exactly what our house needs! Professional services for air duct cleaning, mold removal, pest control etc. The site provides extensive customer testimonies that offer very positive feedbacks of Alliance Environmental Group's services. It features a "Free Report" zone where property owners or managers may request comprehensive information on different enviornmental subject matters. The most interesting service that they offer is cleaning up trama scene. I didn't know that there are professionals for such services!! In the days of CSI, who knows, someone around your neighborhood might need it. The biggest assurance Alliance Environmental Group's services are the photos that they post on the site. They have photos of their recent big projects including removing asbestos contaminated drywall and joint compounds from a four-star hotel in Anaheim near Disneyland, and elimnating molds from 19 country club homes, and cleaning up after a lime spill in the City of Burbank. Photos speak more than a thousand words indeed. The only drawback of Asbestos Advice and Removal is they only offer services in CA thus far.

WWW.Brandidentityguru.com is a great tool for anyone who wants to get a boost in selling their service or product. It features branding guru in helping you get your branding right. It is very interactive as you can click on their many services including a self-evaluation survey for your product or service. It offers a service called Brandstamp, which is kind of like a BBB "Better Business Bureau" stamp except that Brandstamp is ensuring "that your brand identity is in perfect alignment with your brand image in the target markets you serve. It’s the ultimate approval for any brand to obtain." The branding guru has given examples of brands they love and brands they hate. I was surprised to see Southwest airline on their "bad" list. In fact, many of the very profitable businesses including Walmart are on their "bad" list. You can see it for yourself why they are "bad" branding If you are not looking for professional advice on branding, you may still find this website worth a visit, especially if you are interested in anything related to media. In other words, check it out! branding

Thursday, June 26, 2008

This story was conceived long before we even thought about the names of Jeremiah and Jubilee. A baby girl left to be abandoned by the plantation fields of a small village in the remote province of southern China. On that fateful day a kind hearted and childless widow of many years from the countryside walked by after tending her herd by the rice fields and heard the sound of a tiny defenseless baby fighting desperately with fainted cries. She quickly dashed in to the thick plantation field bushes and tracked down the location of the cry and before too long, she found her. What an adorable little face the widow thought, two big round brown eyes with thick lashes and dimples on the side of the cheeks. She must not be just a few weeks old as she was still doing sucking motions with her lips. Startled by the wrinkles on her face, the baby girl cries even louder and seemingly grew more hysterical.

This baby girl was severly dehydrated as her lips were all cracked and smeared with dry blood. She was tied up in urine-soaked blankets and scabs of dried mucus growing across her eyes. A cute but darken muddy button nose, she let out a big snotty sneeze. Without a second to lose, the elderly kind widow grab the baby girl and headed straight back to her village. That first night, the baby girl developed a high fever and coughed her way in to nightfall. She eventually fell asleep just when the sun was rising. She woke up by noon and the elderly woman fed her some light porridge as she waited for the doctor's arrival to examine the child. After a 40 mile travel in to the inlands to reach the village, the doctor finally arrived.

By this time, the little baby was already unconscious and had slipped in to a comatose state. One look at the tiny baby girl, the doctor recommended for the baby girl to be transported to a more adequate environment in order to stay alive. According to the experienced doctor's thorough examination and speculation, the baby girl was left abadoned for at least 2 days and even part of her toe was injured due to perhaps an attack from a small animal or insect. It's critical that the baby might lose her life if treatment was not administered immediately. Without another moments's delay, the doctor took the baby girl along with him and off they traveled back to the city.

A month had passed and still no word from the doctor. Everyday the widow walked the same path as the day she found her, hoping to relive the moment of finding her again. She remembered the very first glimpse of the baby girl as if a mother's first glance at her own baby right after birth. It's a motherly instinct and almost a second nature for her to love that baby eventhough they were together for only a day. Everyday after tending her fields, the widow went to the temple to light an incense for the baby girl hoping that she would live and see her again. The other villagers saw this act of kindness and decides to join in with her everyday by the temple. Everyday, they went to the temple and burnt incense hoping for the little girl to live.

Month after month passed by and soon the revolving season changed one after another like the great Yellow river. Six years had passed and one day the doctor re-appeared at the remote village and carrying with him was a bightly similing little girl. The villagers saw the doctor and somehow recognized the little girl. She must have been the little baby girl that the widow had rescued, they thought. The distinguished doctor asked around for the widow hoping to find her and to tell her the little girl was fine after years of battling with congenital heart illness. Finally the doctor saw a familiar face and stop to ask a passer where the widow had moved to. He put the little girl down and immediately one can notice that she was walking with a limp suffered from injuries of those fateful days. The villagers took a quick glance and shook his head uttering "too late too late...."

The widow passed away a year ago said a gentlemen. He took them to her grave and they both paid their respects. The doctor then told the little girl in a most gentle way, "this is the lady that saved your life." By the tombstone there was an inscription that says, "A happiest and also saddest mother for one day".

There are many stories of babies being abandoned especially baby girls in China. They have been abadoned for many different reasons and sometimes it's just simply because they are girls. Traditionally in the Chinese culture, females have always been looked upon as the inferior race. Girls are thought to be ones who will one day leave home and become a part of her husband's family therefore leaving the parents to care for themselves during old age. Boys on the other hand are put on a different pedestal. They are the strong ones who can help tend the fields, earn a living and be the ultimate bread winner. Another issue is the one-child policy that China adopted in 1979 in an attempt to control population. These two factors have contributed to the many abadoned child stories. The beginning of the story about the widow and the baby girl is all too familiar but the ending of it, in reality, is echoed with unheard cries that set like the sun and never find itself to rise again the next morn. Many of the baby girls, unlike the story told here, did lose their lives because of parental abandonment.

Jeremiah and Jubilee are names that we have given to our future adopted daughters. We may not know where these two girls are now but surely we will find them.

Friday, June 20, 2008

Being a "Myopian," I was amazed to see how low the prices are on the frames/eyeglasses they offer on this website $ 8 Zenni Optical Rx Eyeglasses Darned! Wish I would have run into this site a month ago. Compared to the eyeglasses I bought a month ago from a retail store, I could have saved at least 50% on a similar frame with lens. The prices on frames and lens they offer on this sight start at $8. At first I thought such cheap frames would look like some silly sunglasses my little boy would wear, but to my surprise, they look great. Besides their low prices, they also offer a vast variety of styles. From Paris Hilton to the girl next door, anyone may find a style fit for him or her. One of the site's best feature is their new arrivals which allows you to browse through frames of the latest fashion. The only drawback to buying from this site is that all sales are final, but they do offer giving 50% of your money back if you are unsatisfied with their products. Like any site, buying personal items on line does not allow you to any fitting before buying, but with the low prices they offer on this site, I will definitely give this site $ 8 Zenni Optical Rx Eyeglasses a try the next time I need a new pair of eyeglasses.

Tuesday, June 17, 2008

My son is never short of imaginations. He could come up with endless different type of fight sequences between his figurine characters or come up with excuses not to sleep at night. He would come up with the grossest things to say at the most inappropriate time. I was reading to him one night before he slept. Normally I would read him about two books and that's all it will take to get him to close his eye lids. Not this night, I was up to the fifth book and he was still asking me to read more. In our home, we really advocate reading but this is getting a bit too much. It was late and so I told him to try counting sheeps if he couldn't sleep. Twenty minutes later, I sneak pass his room to check on him. It seemed he had already moved on from counting sheeps. Instead he was counting potatoes.

Two minutes later, he was snoring. My wife just couldn't stop laughing after hearing such cuteness. In the middle of the night, he would wake up again. He would bring his favorite beat-up smelly blankie, stuff animal D-O-G of equal odors over to our room and spends the remaining of the night in between us on our bed.

One night, I was awaken by our little boy tossing around on our bed. Sandwiched between us, his sleeping face turned to me and with his eyes closed but his lips were moving. He seemed to be uttering or whispering something. At first, I thought he wanted something like water but as it turned out, he was whispering somebody's name. I couldn't quite make out what this name was but it sounded like the name starts with the letter "J". It wasn't just one name he whispered but a couple of names and they both start with the letter "J".

Morning came and off I went to work. The day quickly passed and it was time for me to come home. I came home and right before I entered my home, my wife grabed me and asked me to take a peak at our little son. He was playing on his own in his room. I asked my wife, what's going on and she didn't say much of a word but simply urgef me to go take a peek. I went up and passed by our little boy's room. I didn't find him there and I called out his name but no response. I got a little bit more curious and mommy was being mysterious as well. I decided to look in my studies and indeed I found him there. He had a headphone on and was on the computer. Curiously, I look at the computer screen and it was on walmart.com. I ask him why is he on this page since he is normally on children game sites. He said, I saw mommy on this site earlier and she bought a CD for me. She said the CD will be here in a few days. Mommy got me books. Mommy also told me, there are a lot of things here on walmart.com and it's a big big store. All you have to do is type in what you want in this search box here and boom it will come out. See daddy, I type in Lego, and out it comes. This is so cool but daddy could you help me spell Jeremiah and Jubilee?

Mommy was standing outside the room shedding a few tears. Our little boy must of heard our conversation one night about Jeremiah and Jubilee.

Monday, June 2, 2008

Is it 8:30AM or PM?.. and I'm STILL in bed after a few sleepless restless hours due to bad food. Thank God, it's AM. I do feel a little better than I did yesterday, but I just don't want to get up. I need a cup of daddy milk (term coined by my son which refers to coffee) to keep my eyes open and my brain charge. It's raining outside, and I know I have to clean up the room - and vacuum the rest of the house. I really don't mind doing it. It's just the 'getting started' part I don't like.

In Hong Kong all the reports from the latest MRI shows progress upon grandpa's recent bout with brain cancer and he is recovering slowly. Despite his illness, grandpa is still recommending grandma and mommy on where to buy milk for the little grandson. He seems determined to find the right milk for him. Our little guy seems to have developed a very selective taste toward milk in Hong Kong. I guess it's because the milk there is not as fresh tasting as the ones here. As funny as it sounds, there are simply no cows in Hong Kong. There's barely enough room for humans and let alone cows. All the milk comes from the northern border in China. As a result, grandpa's refrigerator is full of unwanted different kinds of branded milk and now just two more days, my wife and son will be heading back home here in the States. Right now, they are busy shopping up a storm in Hong Kong. My wife has decided to boost the local economy in Hong Kong and claims it will have a spiral effect toward US economy since it's a GLOBAL economy. I threathen to change the ATM card code but she was several steps quicker than me.

The recent earthquake and numerous aftershocks have spurred a daily breaking news on the local Hong Kong TV's. My son's eyes have been glued to the recent imageries of building collapses and the damages this natural disaster has caused. A few stories really caught our attention and made us realize how fortunate we are but yet we still take things for granted. How short lived our time can be in an instant. One of the stories was about a group of nine friends who saw the devastation on TV decided to pack up their cars full of food and supplies and made the 10 hour drive to deliver the aids. It's been over 20 days and people say these 9 friends are still there doing whatever they can to help.

The body of a woman was found trapped under the rubbles of a building, one of the hardest hit areas. Her knees were on the ground and her hands pushed up against her body. A rescuer checked her pulse through a crack and confirmed she was dead. He banged on the rubbles and called out a few times, just to see if there was any sign of life. He got no reply. When he was just about to move on, he suddenly realized something. He quickly came back to the woman, checked again under her body. He felt a baby. After much effort, rescuers found a 3 or 4-month old baby wrapped in a red and yellow blanket, laying unharmed under his mom's dead body. He was still sleeping quietly when he was found.

A doctor immediately checked the boy. He then found a cell phone stuck inside the baby's blanket. There was a short message on the screen: "Dear babe, if you could live on, you must remember that I loved you."

Another story involves a female cop with a local Sichuan county who just gave birth to a son less than 6 months ago.

After the quake, many babies lost their parents, and some moms were seriously injured and couldn't take care of their own babies. The first and second floor of a local Hospital have been designated to care for these earthquake babies. Volunteer moms care for them 24 hours, talk to them, clean them and feed them. Saddened by the cryings of these lonesome babies, this female cop name Jiang was determined to help more.

She said: "I'm going to breast feed these babies!" The news that someone is providing breastfeeding spread around fast. Many people lined up for the service. In one picture posted, Jiang was seen feeding two babies at the same time, while she gently talked to a baby: "Eat slowly, baby, good boy..."

After watching this news story, my son decided to finish all the milk in the refrigerator along with some help from mommy and use the 18 hour flight back home to count his blessings. He also said, he wanted to go to Si Chuan and BOOM BOOM away the earthquake. He also wanted to buy the victims shoes and Kentucky Fried chicken. I am glad at a tender age of almost 5, he was able to make a lesson in all of these sadness.

This is my Home

Welcome strangers of the world. I am a regular everyday dad. My hobbies include writing, playing with my son, traveling and of course blogging! In this blog, you will find editorials, funnies, life experiences, commentaries and much more. (Pls also Visit -Download Movies and Live Streaming) I am pleased to present a piece of my soul described to the best of my usage of words. I welcome comments and criticism because only through such trivial tribulation one becomes reformed by others. I hope my readers can keep coming back and give me feed-backs on how to improve my blog. I will continue to write and I will hold all of you readers out there accountable to write back to me.